2010 CONFERENCE A GREAT SUCCESS!

The New Zealand Tourism and Hospitality Research Conference, 2010 hosted at AUT University by the School of Hospitality and Tourism and the New Zealand Tourism Research Institute has achieved its objectives. With over 110 delegates from 17 countries, and 97 papers refereed, presented and published in a 527 page conference proceedings, the 9th edition of the conference has been a great success.

For this year's conference, our local organising committee made an early decision around the philosophy we wished to use. We felt that one of the most important contributions this conference could make is to provide an opportunity and a forum for post-graduate research students and early career researchers to receive constructive feedback on their research and to offer a supportive environment at which to present their research (including their ideas, planning and initial results). As a result of this approach we provided a heavily subsidised registration fee for students (including part-time students) and offered a working paper stream whereby works in progress and research exploration, pilot studies and initial findings could be reviewed and presented. We are extremely pleased with the uptake of this opportunity and feel that our decision to support students and early career researchers (of whom there are many in our fields) was a worthy one.

We also made a decision to promote a better link between research, academia and the tourism and hospitality industries. As a consequence, we adopted the theme for the conference of "adding value through research". We deliberately invited three keynote speakers who have strong credentials and background in industry and with a good understanding of the importance of research for successful practice in tourism and hospitality. Kevin Bowler, Chief Executive of Tourism New Zealand; Alison Morrison, Professor of Hospitality at the University of Surrey, UK; Norm Thompson, Deputy Chief Executive of Air New Zealand and Chair of the Tourism Industry Association of New Zealand. We thank them sincerely for their willingness to contribute to the conference.

The NZTHRC has been and will continue to be dependent on the willingness of institutions and, in particular, individuals within those institutions to organise, promote and host the event. The conference is not 'owned' by any organisation, rather it continues by an informal arrangement and commitment to rotate (in turn) around tertiary education institutions that have significant tourism and hospitality higher education and research activities. We are proud to have hosted the conference in 2010 and wish to acknowledge and thank the many people and organisations who have helped ensure that this year's conference was such a great event.